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Tonight we watched the game peru-new Zealand. It is something big here, there is not another thing on the TV and everyone speaks about it for the last week. The last time they were on a world cup was 36 years ago. Luckily and after suffering a lot, Peru won the second game and qualified for the world cup in Russia!! The city is crazy, like if they won the world cup! Way too much haha.. the government even gave all the people a day of for tomorrow!

We saw the game with Adela and Johannes. We met them yesterday on the bus to puno and we spend all day with them today in lake Titicaca. She is Spanish and he is Dutch, so we have a lot in common :). They are around 37 years old, but really open minded and friendly. We speak a mix of Spanish, English and Dutch.

This is one of the coolest things of traveling, meet new people to learn about their culture, habits, language, etc.. we love it!Read more

We woke up at 3am(yes, so early) to take a bus from Arequipa to an area called Colca valley. We passed through an area 4800m above sea level were was snow. Once in the view point of "la Cruz del condor"we could see a lot of condors flying above us, it was spectacular!! The andinian condors are the biggest bird in the world, they can reach 3m wingspan and fly over 6000 m above sea level.

After that, we ate an amazing Peruvian ceviche and took a bus to Puno, a city next to the lake Titicaca. On the way we passed through a natural reserve where we saw flamengos (didn't know they could live in cold weather above 3800m) and a wild vicuña. This animal has the finest wool in the world (even better than cashimire). And it is not domesticated by the people, so we were really lucky to see it.

You can see the difference between a Llama, Alpaca and Vicuña, by several things. The neck of the Vicuña is shorter and more leaning towards the front, also the ears all smaller. The colour is always the same, light brown and a white belly. The eyes are big and black.Read more

We woke up really late today, at 6:00 (haha). We went by boat over the lake, just a small part though, cause this lake is huge.

Lake Titicaca is the biggest lake of South America and the highest lake of the world. The lake is 3800 meters high. It is on the border of Bolivia and a small part of this lake is in Bolivia. The capital of the region is Puno.

We visited the floating islands. To create this islands the local use the roots of Acha (kind of big and strong grass) and tight them together with natural ropes. Every 15 days they need to put a extra layer of Acha so it stays in good condition. Their houses and boats are made of the same material. They do not speak Spanish but Aymara here. This families live really primitive and work in communities. They catch fish and trade it in the land for potatoes and corn. In each island can live up to 6 families. The community in total consists of 120 islands and 1000 persons.

We also visit another island a the lake, this one was natural, We made a trekking there and eat trout fish for lunch, which was made by a local family and catched in this lake. It tasted great.Read more

Most people had recommended skipping Puno but as I had the time I had decided to check out both sides of Lake Titicaca. Also I wanted to see the man-made Floating Islands of the Peruvian side. I got to Puno in the early afternoon and went out towards the lake to book a tour for the next day to go to the Floating Islands and at least one more Island. I thought a ticket for just the transportation would be the cheapest but as it turned out the tour agencies were in such a battle that it was cheaper to take a tour.
From here I went to the market to buy some food for the trip the next day and something to cook for dinner. I got a little overexcited and ended up having pasta with avocado, tomatoes, cheese and egg for dinner. But it was yummy.
The next morning lots of people were waiting to be picked up for tours all doing exactly the same. But all by different companies. The small streets of Puno were busy with lots of minivans shuttling people from their hotel to the boats.
I met Elsa on my tour. She was from France and we spend the day together. Our first stop was one of the Floating Islands. The Island was probably less than 100sqm and only inhabited a handful of people in 3 little hats. When we got to the island our guide told us the leader of the island would take us out on his boat to show us how they build the Floating Islands. Getting on the boat came at an extra cost but staying behind meant missing the whole explanation. I didn't like the way they ripped of tourists but I was still to curious to stay behind. The Islands are basically build on top of blocks of earth and roots of reed. These blocks get connected till they grow together. On top come different layers of reed put down crosswise. We also got to try the reed.
Some of the bigger islands have been accepting tourists for years now but the smaller ones just started making money about 2 years ago. Same applies for electricity. 2 years ago there was nothing. Now the little hats had a solar panel connected and a TV inside.
From here we went to Taquile which was similar to Isla del Sol. Climbing the steps up the island I felt like I had finally gotten better with working out on altitude as I made it up as one of the firsts. We had lunch on the island and walked around for a while.
The boat back to Puno was 3 hours and I actually think I enjoyed being on the boat watching over the lake the most of the tour.
I had dinner back in Puno and caught a nightbus afterwards to get to Cusco.Read more

So we decide to take a night bus to Puno...we left at around 1030 at night and arrived in Puno at around 5 am. We both took some sleeping pills, but the bus was so cold that neither one of us were able to get much sleep. We had even paid a little more for the first class section....the ticket costing the equivalent of about $20 American.

So we arrive at 5 am and since Jaime is morally opposed to using the bathroom on the bus...and since we both didn't sleep well...we were fair game for the tour agency that leeched on to us when we got off the bus. Turns out that it worked out really well because there was a day tour of Lake Titicaca that left at 7 am....so we signed up for it and it was a great day, even though we were both exhausted.

We took a boat out of the harbor and visited one of the floating islands. The natives have used the reeds to build floating islands for centuries and we got to walk around on one and even took a tour in a reed boat. We talked with the 'president' of the island for a bit and he explained that about 20 people lived in the island and usually about 4 or 5 families live there. After our chat, we l left for another island.

This other island was natural and we got to hike up to the top and have lunch. We got to walk around that island a bit and learn more about the people and the native plants.

Turns out the lake is the 2nd largest in South America and the 19th largest in the world. It's at a very high altitude so walking up to the top of the island definitely made the lungs burn.

On the return voyage, Jaime and Keith postulated on the likelihood that the people on the floating islands...didn't actually live on the floating islands. These two naturally cynical humans watched the islands where there was so much activity earlier and found a lone human sitting on the island. Also, while there were two boats (with outboard motors) on the island earlier, only one remained. This could have been a guard left behind or the others could have been in the huts...who really knows....

Regardless, Jaime and Keith felt obligated to discuss their theory with the other passengers. The other passengers and tourists were taken aback and couldn't understand why the islanders wouldn't actually live there. When the monetary benefits were broken down for them, they too questioned whether or not the islands were truly still inhabited...

We tried to take naps during the boat ride portions and we're back at the dock around 530 pm. We met a cool Brazilian couple and we talked with them about Brazil and they were the first to mention that there was a strike on the Peru side....it turns out that it wasn't really a strike so much as the smugglers in that part of Peru were tired of the police cracking down on them and they wanted to prove a point. Luckily for us, we were able to buy a bus ticket and left on schedule. We left Puno at around 7 in the morning and headed to La Paz, Bolivia....Read more

We were quite relieved when our host parents turned up after being led to our host be a grumpy teenage boy. However after some bonding over cute animals, volleyball and terrible Spanglish we were all fast friends. It's a fantastically peaceful way of living